


born like this, don't even gotta try

by shellsinsand



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Fluff, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-12
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-01 22:07:29
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,298
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23614243
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shellsinsand/pseuds/shellsinsand
Summary: It’s not that he hadn’t been, before, but now that they’re all dating or whatever, it feels like his brain gets caught on it, like he should be noticing all the ways Obito and Rin hold his attention.
Relationships: Hatake Kakashi/Nohara Rin/Uchiha Obito
Comments: 6
Kudos: 49





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> the writer can have a little grad school au, as a treat
> 
> (title is from juice by lizzo)

Tuesday nights are Kakashi’s favorite for a number of reasons, the biggest of which is that his only Wednesday responsibility is attending the lab meeting at 3:30pm. The second biggest is that Obito volunteers for some children’s literacy program Wednesday morning and inevitably spends the night before prepping his shit and bitching about the program coordinator’s latest crazy scheme. This week’s involves origami frogs. Kakashi is 90% Obito had explained what the frogs are supposed to be for, but he’s on his fourth mango margarita – courtesy of Rin organizing Kurenai’s bachelorette party last weekend – and he’s lost track of the plot. The important thing is that Obito is hunched over their curbside coffee table making faces at tiny colorful pieces of paper as he monologues.

“ - anyway I am a _student_ ,” Obito says, creasing the paper with a flourish. “Who says I have time for this?”

“Uh huh,” he says, letting the mango-tequila slush melt on his tongue, and very kindly does not poke the holes that line of reasoning deserves; he needs to remember to ask where the hell Obito learned origami when he’s sober enough to pay proper attention to the answer. Right now the cut of Obito’s mouth – somewhere between performative annoyance and a grin – is really distracting. All of him is distracting. It’s not that he hadn’t been, before, but now that they’re all _dating_ or whatever, it feels like his brain gets caught on it, like he _should_ be noticing all the ways Obito and Rin hold his attention. Tonight it’s the deftness of his hands and the curl of his shoulders and – 

“Kakashi,” Obito says, snapping his fingers in his face. 

“What?” he snaps, and licks the sloshed margarita off his fingers. He can feel the flush crawling up his face and something fluttering in his stomach; it’s been happening more since Christmas, since everything. He sets his drink on the floor and slouches deeper into the couch. Some part of him was hoping that having words for everything would fix it, but it hadn’t – it’s still there, buzzing under his skin. Obito leans against the sofa and props his chin on his hands. In the shitty light from the lamp his eyes are nearly bottomless, black against the warm glow of his skin. 

“Kakashi,” he whispers and his voice feels like gravity, pulling him in. He shuffles closer until Kakashi can smell the cinnamon gum he’s irrationally fond of. His limbs feel too heavy, stuck to the incredibly fake leather of their second hand couch, and he can’t – 

“What the fuck,” he gasps, trying to force more air into his lungs. It’s never – is this what dying feels like? When Obito cups the side of his face he shudders and Obito has the audacity to _grin_. Where the hell is Rin? 

“You think I’m hot,” Obito says, stupid grin and dumb hair and and and. 

“Fuck you,” he says, half on reflex, and then Obito kisses him. It’s easy and familiar and something new in his stomach twists, leaves him gasping and clutching at Obito’s shirt. Kakashi is so aware of every part of him Obito’s touching that he thinks he’s going to die and _fuck_. Even a broken clock is right twice a day. 

“Shh,” Obito says, biting at the hinge of his jaw, and suddenly he’s on the couch, a steady weight all down Kakashi’s side. “I’ve got you.” 

“Just,” he says, not sure if he’s too drunk or not drunk enough, and flails around until he gets a handful of Obito’s hair and can drag their mouths together again; it’s like breathing in sparks. It’s not the first time they’ve made out, but it’s the first time Kakashi can’t follow the plot of it. Everything is just hot and wet and seemingly hardwired directly to his dick. Time slides sideways and away from him until he can’t tell if they’ve been on the couch for five minutes or five hours, everything narrowed down to Obito’s mouth and everywhere his hands are touching and everywhere Kakashi wants him to touch and – 

“Hang on,” Obito says, somewhere between a laugh and a groan, when Kakashi bucks up against his thigh. “Let me...” Obito shifts, pushing him flat onto his back, and then suddenly his hand is wet and closing around Kakashi’s cock. He makes a high, keening noise that he’s definitely going to be mortified about tomorrow morning and comes in his pants like a fucking teenager. _Fuck_. 

“You,” Obito says, hair wild and mouth bright bright red.

“I,” Kakashi croaks.

“Y’all,” Rin says, somewhere behind them, and – in what is not his most rational moment – Kakashi shoves Obito off the couch. 

He yelps, whacks Kakashi’s chin with his flailing, and then hits the ground with a thump. There’s a moment of silence, but tragically no void appears in the middle of their living room to swallow him. 

“I’m drunk,” he says, because he feels like that should be part of the record. “ _Tequila_ drunk.” 

“Oh my god.” Rin’s voice sounds like Christmas and her birthday and the end of finals have come at once, all excitement and dawning glee. “The mango margs.” 

“I hate everyone in this house,” Obito groans, but it’s hard to hear him over how hard Rin is laughing. He rolls over to the edge of the couch, grimacing but refusing to adjust his boxers and give Rin more ammunition, and looks down at Obito.

“Let’s _n_ _ever_ talk about this,” he says, and absolutely nothing about Obito’s little half grin makes his heart flip flop. 

“I don’t know about never,” he says and leans up until they’re sharing air again. It doesn’t feel like before, just warm and easy. “You think I’m hot.”

“Do not,” he mutters and pokes Obito’s cheek when he looks meaningfully towards his shorts. Obito bites at his fingers

“If you run, I’ll distract her.”

“Deal,” he whispers, because he knows a good thing when he finds it. Obito rolls to his feet and the last thing Kakashi sees before scrambling toward the hallway is him pressing Rin back against the wall, swallowing her laughter into his mouth. It’s… he could… Kakashi shakes his head firmly and runs up the stairs. One thing at a time. 

He strips the minute he makes it to his room, closing the door a little too hard and flinging his clothes blindly toward his closet. Shower, he definitely needs a shower. The water takes forever to heat up and he makes himself brush his teeth while he waits, doesn’t let himself pace. 

“This is fine,” he says, spitting toothpaste into the sink, because he is _not_ having a second sexuality crisis at twenty five. His life is not that much of a disaster. “Just take a goddamn shower, Hatake.” 

He  does . The water is lukewarm at best and his hands are still sloppy with alcohol; it takes more concentration than it should to not get shampoo in his eye. If he scrubs down hard enough his skin turns bright red it’s only because he doesn’t want to wake up smelling like a bar tomorrow.  When he gets out, he drinks a glass of water as he digs out his oldest sweatpants. 

His bed is covered in the load of laundry he’d done earlier this afternoon – half a lifetime ago – and he debates folding it for about two seconds before he gives up and goes to Rin’s room. The light it already off, but she makes a grumbly half asleep noise when he crawls in behind her and pulls his arm over her waist; he hides his face in her neck. 

“I don’t know what’s happening,” he says, because he can’t say _what if it doesn’t keep happening_ or _what is I never feel it about you_ without feeling the sharp edge of panic. Because Rin is this too big, too bright part of his heart; she’s a hidden competitive streak and absolutely no bullshit. She’s his best friend and he _just_ got this and he’s already fucking it up. 

“I already know I’m hot,” she mumbles, yawning. “Your dick isn’t going to change that.” She pats clumsily at the side of his face and hums something that sounds suspiciously Lizzo-esque; he hiccups a laugh against her skin. 

“Go to sleep,” she says and just this once he listens. 

\--

When he wakes up the next morning,  mouth dry and  head full of sand, it’s to a quiet house and a post it stuck to his forehead:  _Lover – remember to make my bed. p.s. grey ace is still ace._ He rolls his eye. 

“I know that,” he mutters to Rin’s ceiling and flops over to check his phone; no doubt both of them are being insufferably smug in the group chat. There’s like fifteen messages from the new undergrad that he ignores – Tenzo can deal with it – and Genma’s trying to organize a movie night in the big whatapp, but there’s only one message from Rin. 

It’s a picture of the whiteboard in the kitchen: the left half taken up by their grocery list and on the right side, Rin has written  _things that turn kakashi on_ in bright purple letters, followed by  _origami, frogs?,_ and  _mango margs_ . Underneath that, Obito has scrawled  _his b o y f r i e n d_ and underlined it twice. She’s sent it to him and Obito followed by  _gonna need more data, babe_ . 

_I’m breaking up with you both_ , he sends and rolls out of bed to go pee. 

When he gets back, Obito has replied with five kissy faces and then:  _wait, did that count as public sex? Semi public?_ Kakashi is dating a moron. 

_No_ . _Aren’t you supposed to be teaching the Youth of America to read?_

_sugarplum you know I can multitask._

_VETO,_ Rin says before Kakashi gets the chance to then:  _got clinical until 5, will trade one neck massage for afternoon coffee._ It’s a blatant ploy to check up on Kakashi and figure out how much she can mock him, but also – Rin’s massages are fucking incredible. 

_2pm_ , he says, and the flurry of hearts they both send back doesn’t make him smile at all. 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a random snippet from before they started dating (Kakashi's lab is absolutely betting on when all of them will start dating)

It only takes Obito five weeks of the semester – and staring blankly at the shelf where Kakashi’s weird protein granola normally lives at 8:30 on a Sunday morning – to realize he’s become a suburban mom. His cart contains a motley collection of vegetables neither Rin nor Kakashi requested but that they definitely need and there’s a note at the bottom of his list to pick up Rin’s birth control. He has a _grocery list_.

“Jesus fuck,” he mutters; Kakashi’s granola fails to miraculously appear. “I am the house mom.” Somewhere, his own mom is laughing.

“...Obito?”

“Huh?” It takes him a second to place the kid – brown hair, still a bit of a baby face – as the new whiz kid in Kakashi’s lab. He’d looked older in the shitty light of the department mixer; in the harsh light of the grocery store and what look suspiciously like pajama pants he barely looks like an undergrad. How old had Kakashi said he was? Nineteen? “...Tenzo, right?”

“Yeah, uhm, can I?” He gestures at the cereal behind Obito’s cart.

“Shit, yeah, sorry.” He backs up, resting his forearms on the cart handle. “Trying to figure out which granola to get for Bakashi.” The kid moves like he’s ready to bolt at any minute, thin and wide eyed. He makes a mental note to bully Kakashi into inviting him over for dinner.

“Ah – he steals that one from Genma sometimes?”

“Awesome.” He tosses a bag of it next to the ginger candies Rin insists she can’t study without. “Thanks for the save; I’ll see you around.”

“Yeah...” His mouth twitches briefly into a grimace. “Are you, uhm, dating?” Obito blinks.

“Kakashi?”

“And Rin?”

“Am I dating Kakashi and Rin?”

“Are you?”

“Who’s on first,” he mutters to the baby bok choy. Maybe he should rethink going outside too early on Sundays.

“What?”

“No, I am not dating Kakashi nor Rin.” He snorts. “At least not last time I checked.”

“Ah,” Tenzo says; he does not look convinced.

“Have a good one,” he says and goes to check out before anything else weird can happen.

* * *

When he gets home, both Kakashi and Rin have made it downstairs in varying states of alertness. He kicks off his sandals and juggles the seven grocery bags onto the counter. Neither one of them make a move to help, the ingrates.

“Are we dating?” he asks the room at large, saving a pear before it can suicide off the counter.

“Do you want to be?” Rin asks, squinting up at him from the kitchen table. For a soon to be doctor she’s absolutely terrible about wearing her glasses. Obito shrugs.

“Tenzo asked – figured I would check.”

“Not this week, honey, I have a headache,” Kakashi deadpans from where he’s slouched halfway off the sofa. Obito flicks him off and goes to put away the horrible dairy free ice cream Rin’s gotten addicted to.

“You should invite him to family dinner though. He looks one exam away from a nervous break.”

“I don’t think most people would call family dinners are a soothing experience,” Rin says. Obito frowns at her.

“We’re great.”

“No event involving Gai is soothing,” Kakashi mutters like he doesn’t voluntarily – regardless of whatever flimsy excuse he gives – hang out with the man three times a week. Obito points the celery at him.

“Just invite him.”

“Whatever. Did you buy kale _again_?”

“You are welcome to go to Kroger whenever you want,” he sniffs, and magnanimously ignores look they exchange like he’s not right there. “This is not a restaurant.”


End file.
